Another prison riot in Brazil leaves 10 inmates dead
AT LEAST 10 inmates have been killed in a prison riot in northeastern Brazil, the latest in a wave of fatal uprisings in the country’s overcrowded prisons that have killed nearly 100 this year – with many of the victims decapitated and mutilated.
The riot began around 5pm on Saturday at the State Penitentiary of Alcaçuz, near Natal in the northeastern state of Rio Grande do Norte, said Juliska Azevedo, a spokeswoman for the state government. In a statement, the authorities said the riot was caused by a fight between prisoners from two wings and that at least 10 had been confirmed dead.
“A group of prisoners managed to get out of their cells and invade another wing,” said Caio Bezerra, the secretary of public security and social defense for Rio Grande do Norte. “There were frictions, there were attacks. But police are already working to contain the situation so it does not reach other pavilions in the same prison.”
Late Saturday, the police had yet to regain control of the entire prison. Desperate relatives had gathered outside, and some had even fought with the police in attempts to get in.
Killings and decapitations are common in Brazil’s prisons, where conditions are sometimes described as medieval, but violence has exploded this year. The latest uprising followed the massacre of 56 prisoners during a 17-hour riot at a jail near Manaus in the Amazon state of Amazonas on New Year’s Day. Many of the dead were decapitated and dismembered. Four more prisoners were killed in a nearby prison the next day.
State authorities ascribed blame for the Manaus deaths to the Family of the North, an Amazon drug gang that had attacked prisoners connected to a rival gang, the São Paulo-based First Capital Command. The gangs were believed to be fighting for control of lucrative drug smuggling routes.
Four days later, 33 prisoners were killed and many were dismembered at a prison in Boa Vista in Roraima state, in the far north of Brazil. State authorities said the First Capital Command was behind the killings. Then four more prisoners were killed in a third Manaus prison after being moved from the site of the first massacre.
Azevedo said that the gang, known by its Portuguese initials, PCC, and a Rio Grande do Norte gang called the Crime Syndicate were involved in the riot Saturday. The prison has a capacity of about 620 prisoners but was holding 1,100, she said.